27 April 2008

April 27 At Your Service!

.Just before tea-time there came a tremendous ring on the front-door bell, and then he remembered! He rushed and put on the kettle, and put out another cup and saucer, and an extra cake or two, and ran to the door.

"I am so sorry to keep you waiting!" he was going to say, when he saw that it was not Gandalf at all. It was a dwarf with a blue beard tucked into a golden belt, and very bright eyes under his dark-green hood. As soon as the door was opened, he pushed inside, just as if he had been expected.

He hung his hooded cloak on the nearest peg, and "Dwalin at your service!" he said with a low bow.

Gandalf sat the head of the party with the thirteen dwarves all round: Bilbo sat on a stool at the fireside, nibbling at a biscuit (his appetite was quite taken away), and trying to look as if this was all perfectly ordinary and not in the least an adventure. The dwarves ate and ate, and talked and talked, and time got on.

"Now for some music!" said Thorin. "Bring out the instruments!"

The dark came into the room from the little window that opened in the side of The Hill; the firelight flickered - it was April - and still they played on, while the shadow of Gandalf's beard wagged against the wall.

April 27, the day of the unexpected party!

Hope your tea-time is filled with so many strange and wonderful stories, that you don't finish until well past dark. We like it dark for dark business, as they say - with dragons and whatnot.